Hinduism never had any problems with other faiths.The problem with Socalled Abrahamic religions like christianity(and islam) is they have an exclusivistic view on faith.It is like "either you are with me or against me"(ex: bible nt: luke :11 :23).
So, if you want to accept that their faith is correct you will have to accept that your faith is wrong.There is no other way.
How do you respond to this core ideology of these faiths?
First of all, I live in the United States. So I am familiar with the many different sects of Christianity including live near a very nice orthodox Jewish group and have had respectful and interesting conversations with some of their Rabbis. This is why I pointed out, respectfully to you, that although Judaism is indeed Abrahamic, I know for a fact that missionary conversion is against their teachings.
So you err by over-generalizing ALL Abrahamic faiths as being one and the same thing, out to convert and destroy other cultures.
You must also understand, there are so many different ideologies among these many Christian groups. Some are quite fanatical and equivalent to jihadis. I do not deny or ignore their danger. You don't know me but I have written expose on these groups for years warning of the dangers.
My concern with this thread is that Hindus (I am a Hindu-Sikh) are in danger of veering into an equal extreme in response to this menace. What will people gain if they lose Dharma trying to protect Dharma? So, from that perspective I think a reasoned balance is required.
You do realize that Jihadis target Jews, not so much due to religion, but due to the politics of the Israel-Palestinian conflict which is terribly unfortunate with evil things being done by both sides. However, if we take a blanket political view that All Abrahamic religions are BAD, and they ALL want to forcibly and fradulently CONVERT, we will misjudge the intentions of the Jews in India who are interested in outreach to ancient communities of fellow Jews there ONLY. And then our response will not be reasoned and balanced, but extremist and unfair.
Moshe'le Holtzberg Crys "Mommy!"
An emotional video of the Mumbai Jewish community and an Israeli delegation which held a ceremony in memory of the men and women murdered by terrorists at the Chabad center.
Rabbi Shimon Rosenberg, the father of Chabad emissary and terrorst victim Mrs. Rivka Holtzberg, spoke of moving from Israel to Mumbai and run the Chabd House there in till Little Moshe'le grows up and is old enough to lead it himself.
Mrs' Rosenberg the grandmother broke into tears as she hears her 2 year-old grandson Moishe'le cry and search for his mother.
So, you are asking me personally, and I'm honestly trying to explain. I would without hesitation support armed combat if necessary to stop an evil person from committing a crime against people I love and my own community. In some cases the missionary outreach in India must be stopped through force and there is no other way.
However, if people are to act from Dharmic principles, first they must not do what the fanatics do, and that is to mix one thing together with another thing. All Jews are not BAD, all Christians are not BAD, all Muslims are not BAD. To demonize a religion (Sikhs are familiar with this) makes a target out of everybody in that religion. And then innocent people get killed.
When a religious group feels assaulted, aggrieved, and their rights denied. Sometimes they overreact. This was the case with Ajaib Singh Bagri who announced publicly that 50,000 Hindus should be killed in retaliation for Operation Bluestar. And the following year Air India 182 exploded mid-flight killing all 329 people including women and children.
Air India 182 - Trailer
On June 22, 1985, Air India 182 left Montreal, bound for New Delhi. Four hours after takeoff, a bomb ripped through the baggage compartment, killing all 329 people on board. It was the most deadly act of air terrorism in history before 9/11. The film counts down the final weeks and hours before Air India 182 disappeared off Irish radar screens and we sleepwalked into the era of international terrorism.
http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/...0c2GA/340x.jpg
Air India flight 182 memorial
This is how inflammatory anger overreacts and loses Dharma. We have to defend the Dharma against all onslaughts of evil, and this includes the distortions and tendancies in our own minds and hearts. To protect the precious Dharma, it must be from within as well as from without.
Since that time, the Sikh radicals have done nothing but demonize Hindus as evil. Is this right? Is this Dharma? Should Sikhs listen to them and walk that path? Should Hindus listen to you? Where will your path lead if genocide is the predictable result of ostracizing and demonizing anybody? Does this make anybody's communities safer?
So it is my honest opinion that this approach is too short sighted. You think you are solving one problem by waking up communities to a danger, but you risk creating a larger problem that in demonizing an entire religion, people will overreact and scapegoat those groups and going to the same level as the fanatics by targeting innocents for hatred and animosity and violence.
So, if you want to accept that their faith is correct you will have to accept that your faith is wrong.There is no other way.
How do you respond to this core ideology of these faiths?
If I accept their faith is correct then I believe in their exclusivity teaching. But because I believe they have a wrong understanding of profound spiritual concepts I don't invent an exclusivity teaching of my own to shun them. I won't waste my time arguing with them either. I accept that they are at a level of spiritual development where an extremist faith speaks to them and meets their needs. I have the maturity to recognize that until those needs are met, the extremism won't stop either. So it really isn't a religious or interpretive scripture issue. There are politics of deprivation and feelings of wretchedness and being wronged which are at issue here.
And I reiterate, if you want to stop the missionaries in India then you have to address the needs of the communities they exploit. These are usually the tribals, the poor, the Dalits, the discriminated. These are the people converting to Christianity, Islam and Communism with a hate for India.
"The word 'dalit(a)' comes from the Sanskrit - root 'dal' - and means 'held under check' ,'suppressed', or 'crushed', or, in a looser sense, 'oppressed'.
Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, a Dalit, and one of the leaders of India's Independence movement, is considered the chief architect of the Indian Consitution, in which Article 17 abolishes untouchability. Since, under the aegis of the Constitution of India affirmative action has now been implemented for the uplift of the 'Dalits'.
The term scheduled castes/scheduled tribes (SC/ST) along with non-caste tribes are also used in the Indian legal system to refer to this social group in India."
http://www.statemaster.com/encyclope...%28outcaste%29 We have to address why they hate and why they are hurt before we can ever win their hearts in any debate with fundamentalists.
Now believe me when I say I'm familiar with fundamentalists. There are pro-Khalistanis in most North American Sikh sangats. They only talk about how wronged they are and how evil the other community is. This is the psychology which attunes them to retributive violence. So when a Hindu group starts talking the same dynamics as the Khalistanis, I feel it will result in the same kind of "counter-terrorism" to the one perceived. I agree missionaries have to be stopped. They are funded by foreign governments with the intention to take over vote blocs in India and influence Indian elections favorable to the foreign powers. But stopping missionaries and curtailing their agenda is radically different from demonizing and trashing EVERY Christian community. You don't like it when they do it to Hindus. What makes you think you will succeed when you do it to them?
What you are dealing with in the Indian Christian missionary phenomenon is not really a religious group of fanatics. But a religious group funded and trained by the American CIA for a subversive military purpose. And it makes me wonder who is behind the Hindu fundamentalists. Because if all sides are working against the center, soon the center will give way. And that is the ultimate anti-nationalism.
Overreacting to Christians in general won't solve any of these problems. The nature of these problems is far more insidious. That's why we need to address with dasvandh/charity the needs of the communities the missionaries target. We should back policies which break down barriers of discrimination, lack of housing, food, child labor, exploitation in the form of criminal gangs and forced prostitution, the destruction of farmers by Monsanto. Until we meet the egregious needs, don't be surprised to see missionaries and Naxals and jihadis and Khalistanis. That is where they recruit their militants from, from the discriminated and aggrieved. Look at the document China has written stating India should be broken into pieces by turning one community against another. In targeting the Christian missionary problem you might be playing into China's game plan. And since the US is indebted to China, it might also be the CIA's game plan.
But in any event, you have to look at who is manipulating and funding the fundamentalists.
Break India, says China think-tank
TNN 12 August 2009, 02:21am IST
You will no more stop a demonic mentality who is a fundamentalist bent on conversion then you will stop a criminal from committing crimes. So why should we develop a demonic mentality in return by isolating others, by Hindu exclusivism, by hating and trashing the beliefs and teachings of others? If you have a higher belief and teaching, what is there to prove? Your "enemy" is greater than you even imagine if you think it's just jihadi groups and fundamentalist groups.
http://www.sakaaltimes.com/Article/7...100_secvpf.gif
Jharkhand police officer Francis Induwar’s wife Sunati Indwar, centre, cries after her husband’s body was found on Tuesday
There are games within games within games being played at India's expense. And the central government had better wake up to the threat. But waking up to the threat doesn't mean becoming a Hindu fundamentalist with zero tolerance of other nationalities or religions. That simply means your enemy has already won and you lose Dharma.
"We are only in the very dawn of COMMERCE, and we owe that dawn, with all its promise to the channels opened up by CHRISTIAN MISSIONARIES ... The effect of the missionary enterprise of the English speaking people will be to bring them the ... CONQUEST OF THE WORLD."- Rev. Frederick Gates, Baptist Minister
Letter to John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
April 17, 1905
Christian Missionaries, CIA Agents?
http://www.timboucher.com/journal/20...es-cia-agents/
We don't have to deal with them through a similar version of religious hatred. But they should be dealt with as anti-nationalists, agitators, and threats to the security of the nation of India. They should be exposed as part of a Colonial paradigm of repression and hate against Hinduism and Hindu culture. They should be exposed as part of a racist agenda to slander and defame all nationalities of indigenous Indian persons.
So I think them no less a threat. But I don't lump every Christian group into the same category. And I don't think trashing respected Hindu saints and swamis does less than their agenda to derail Dharmic teaching and replace it with an asuric counterpart answerable to neferious foreign governments.
Bhul chak maaf karni ji